3D Software?

You'd best visit www.3dlinks.com for any info you might need, they have a whole section on converters of all types as well as all the links you'll ever need for models, etc. I have to say that the 2 or 3 converters I've tried pretty much sucked, but I dont have the money for the full-on commercial packages so I cant comment on them. I dont even know what format Blender models come in, so I dont know which converters might be useful to you anyway. Personally the best converter I ever found was an actual 3D program itself, Pixel 3D, which could load and save in a ton of different formats.

If your going to use Blender then you have several options (i.e. which script you get for conversion). The best one I've seen is called IOSuite (website). The next release of Blender (in a couple of weeks) will include the ability to directly register Python scripts into the interface. I suspect that IOSuite will be one of the first things that will make use of this and if I'm not mistaken it just might be bundled along with Blender (for the next release).

If you want to take a non-Blender route there is a program called "AccuTrans" (website). It's not free but it's not expensive either. I've never used it so I don't know if it's garbage or not.

Wow, thanks guys! That's a lot of good info. I downloaded several of the programs and since Anim8or looks the least intimidating I've been using it as a starting place. I can see where Blender certainly looks to have more features, but I'm guessing the basics are fairly common.

So far I've managed to get the most basic shapes of my ship, the wings and the main fuselage, built to what looks like about the right scale and position to each other. I'm setting it aside until this weekend when hopefully I'll have some time to go through some tutorials for either Anim8or or Blender. So far it's been easy because it's all been a matter of using the basic shapes in the software and adjusting their size, scale, and position, but from here there's some fairly specific stuff I want to do that I'm clueless on.

One thing I'm curious about since most of you model ships that have already been designed is how do you make sure your model is accurate? Do you measure angles and proportions on line drawings? What I'm trying to do is so much simpler because I can just eyeball it and say "Yeah, that looks right." I'm just blown away by how people do the really accurate models of more complex shapes like any of the Enterprises. Simply amazing.

Accuracy is a product of accurate reference information in the first place. Many things out there only have screencaps and pictures and suchlike, which makes it a 'best guess' when it comes to making a model of it. If it looks like it, then you're doing well. Get as many photos from as many angles as you can and keeep referring to them as you work.

For well known stuff like the various Enterprises you can download the blueprints or orthographic drawings of the ship in question, and most 3D programs I've worked with allow you to place a reference image in the background of your modelling window so you can basically trace the outlines. In Lightwave you have the front, side and top views of your model as you work, so when someone like Reverend makes a 5-view layout of a ship I then chop it up into it's seperate views and load the appropriate pictures into the view windows. I then 'trace' the blueprint and out pops an accurate 3D model.

Here's my little ship so far. It's all done with the basic shapes in Anim8or so far, which I'm betting is completely the wrong way to do it. My project for this weekend is to figure out how to taper the fuselage down into the point of the nose for the cockpit and maybe make the leading edges of the wings something other than flat surfaces. I also think I'm getting the scale of it all screwed up. Based on the guns on top and bottom it looks about the size of a small shuttle when it's supposed to be the size of the Millennium Falcon or the Ebon Hawk from KOTOR. I'm pretty happy with it so far, though, since I'd never tried anything like this before Monday.

Posted by Four Mad Men:
There's definately a learning curve there. Knowing the keyboard commands and mouse buttons really speeds things up. I posted a link to (an old but still usefull) list of keyboard commands for Blender on another thread in this forum.

I believe the subject was "Downloaded Blender". But a title search for "blender" should turn it up.

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I'll take a look. But frankly, I'm about ready to give up on Blender. Its so hard to figure out how to make it do the simplest things (like selecting a different object) that IMO its just not worth it.

Posted by Four Mad Men:
There's definately a learning curve there. Knowing the keyboard commands and mouse buttons really speeds things up. I posted a link to (an old but still usefull) list of keyboard commands for Blender on another thread in this forum.

I believe the subject was "Downloaded Blender". But a title search for "blender" should turn it up.

Click to expand...

I'll take a look. But frankly, I'm about ready to give up on Blender. Its so hard to figure out how to make it do the simplest things (like selecting a different object) that IMO its just not worth it.

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Here's the post on Blender Basics, it's not much but have a look if your still interested.

Related question... For a small (or not so small, depends ) project using VRML, I am looking for a 3D modelling tool that exports to VRML 2.0 (VRML97). It should be as free and as intuitive (in this order) as possible, and doesn't need to have too many functions - I never tried 3D modelling before, and only need to produce relatively simple shapes.

Well there's mixed feeling about how intuitive it is (I personally think it's just fine in that regard) but Blender can export to VRML 2.0 (and 1.0). I have no clue about others but I'm pretty sure the professional packages do.

You might have a look at Anim8or or Wings3D as several people here have found them easier to use. Perhaps they have what your looking for.

To be perfectly honest with you, most of the more technical stuff went over my head but as a Lightwaver I was intrigued at reading that LightWave's renderer is "showing its age".
With the animation project I'm working on at the moment I can kind of see that now.

Posted by Daedalus12:
Has everyone in here tried Houdini? I heard it is completely different from other 3D packages.

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Houdini has a very powerful scripting language, and a very nice external renderer, but it is both insanely difficult to use and very expensive. Unless you're doing serious film work, I'd avoid Houdini - and even then Maya is just as powerful and well-supported.

If you're beginning with 3D animation, I'd recommend a more user-friendly package like LW or MAX. I've not tried Cinema4D or some of the other packages, but I've heard good things about them.

The most important thing is to learn the techniques and not the packages. Learn basic design, and especially lighting - those skills are valuable regardless of what 3D package you end up working with.